News & Articles

Today, the Supreme Court denied the Trump administration’s request for an expedited judicial appeal, in an attempt to bypass the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals while appealing a lower Federal District Court’s ruling that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program must continue to accept renewal applications during the appeals process. What it means is that the Supreme Court wants DACA to wind its way through the legal process before tackling this issue. We predict that it will take at least 1.5 years to go through. By then, we hope that Congress will get a comprehensive Immigration bill passed. Until such time, the Citizenship and Immigration Service will continue to accept and approve DACA application.

Last September, President Trump originally ordered DACA to end on March 5, 2018, but on January 10, 2018, California Federal District Judge William Alsup temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s efforts to end DACA, and ordered the administration to resume receiving DACA renewal applications.

Now, if President Trump wishes to continue its appeal of Judge Alsup’s ruling, it must first file an appeal with Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, traditionally a liberal leaning court that is likely to deny Trump’s appeal. Once that denial is issued, then President Trump may resume its appeal to the Supreme Court. However, even then, the Supreme Court is under no obligation to grant certiori, meaning it would agree to hear the Trump administration’s appeal. All these appeal steps will take time, from a year to a year and a half.

While these sets of appeals are taking place, the lower court ruling by Judge Alsup forcing the Department of Homeland Security to continue to accept DACA renewals still stands. Thus, DACA recipients (“Dreamers”) can continue to renew their work permits under DACA. More importantly, it buys time for Congress and the President to hopefully find a resolution to allow the nearly 700.000 Dreamers to permanently remain in the United States.

Suppose you have a petulant child who hates your brother Jim and does not want him to visit your home. You have shut the child down, but the child just whines and screams. You know reasoning does not work. So you just say, OK, Jim cannot come for no reason. But if Jim has a reason, he can come. You are giving your child a lollipop. The child shows off his lollipop. The next time, Jim comes, you tell the child, but Jim wants to visit family. That’s a reason. And he will not come for no reason. I promise. Give the child another lollipop and hope the child forgets about this in 120 days.
That sums up the Supreme Court’s decision to lift the temporary restraining order against Trump’s travel ban. It has no substance, does not really impact anyone, and gives Trump his lollipop.

As I have said in my blog before, there is no justification for the travel ban on 6 countries: Syria, Iran, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Libya. Are there terrorist cells in these countries? Yes, of course. But the procedures in place already have the US Consulate performing extreme security checks before an individual is granted visa to enter the US. At one point in time, during the Obama administration, some suspected terrorists entered the US. They were deported and Obama suspended travel for these countries until a more thorough vetting procedure was implemented. But that was done, and no suspected terrorists have entered since. So clearly Trump just want to appease his intolerant base with the travel ban

The Supreme Court removed the temporary restraining order with a lesser temporary restraining order. The people not impacted are:

1. Anyone with a current visa—even a visitor’s visa issued before June 14, 2017
2. Anyone with a work visa-H, J, L, O,P, R I, F
3. Anyone with an immigrant or non Immigrant (K) family based visa
4. Diplomats

The Only group that is NOT covered are foreign tourists who are coming to USA for visiting sites in the United States. But seriously, how many tourists from these 6 countries do we find, just visiting the Grand Canyon or Disney Land? They have enough problems on their hand to think about expensive vacations. And the super-rich, who can afford to, does have either business or family connections.

B visa holders should bring with them documents showing family ties or business ties. Attending a conference, or lecturing is a valid business tie, and “mother in laws” are valid family relation. (Supreme Court said this, not me). Other visa holders should bring their visa related documents just to be sure.

So in effect, it’s a useless ban. It does affect Muslims, because Muslims are a majority in these countries. Trump said he had “clear victory”, and the ACLU vowed to fight it.
This ban creates fear among many Muslim legal travelers. Attorney’s make money playing into that fear.

The second travel ban executive order, expected to take effect today has been halted, by two federal courts in Hawaii and Maryland. Trump had recrafted the travel ban to exclude Permanent Residents and US Citizens, originally hailing from the seven countries. He has also halted the processing of refugees from those seven countries.
Although the second travel ban is not, on its face unconstitutional, it does have desperate impact on persons of Muslim faith. Since Customs and Border Patrol officers have wide discretion as to who to “suspect” and “admit” their innate biases do play a factor. Report of abuses in recent times are rampant. Even Mohammad Ali’s parents were detained simply because they were of the Muslim faith.
“There is nothing “veiled” about this press release: “Donald Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” Judge Watson of Hawaii wrote. And one may also argue that there has not been any recent incidents of terrorists trying to enter the United States from those seven countries.
Thus this useless travel ban encourages discrimination towards certain religion. If we weigh whether America can be safer with the travel ban vs. whether discrimination towards Muslim is a legitimate State interest, the travel ban becomes clearly unconstitutional. The purpose of enacting it is nothing more than fulfilling Trump’s campaign promise to ban Muslims and serves no more than fueling hatred towards Muslims. The budget cuts to the Department of State will only enhance and prolong this process.

I do not do removals (Deportation) and thus I do not have any financial stake in Trump’s massive deportation project. I do not object to a President enforcing a law, whatever it is. My objections are entirely based upon my Centrist fiscal views.
1. By detaining individuals, we are simply feeding, clothing and paying all expense (including medical) for the illegal immigrants. And that is our Tax payer dollars
2. They are given a bond hearing, and when most of them can’t pay the bond, we have to keep them detained.
3. Do the Math: there are 5000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Officers in the US. There are a total of 242 Immigration Judges in the US. There are 11 to 13 million illegals in the US. So to get a hearing will take a long time, during which, us, Taxpayers will house, feed and pay medical expenses for them.
4. Lawyers can further delay the process by filing appeals. This process can go on for years
5. Once we do deport them, if there is no Comprehensive Immigration plan, and there are jobs in the US, the individuals will come right back in. They just earned a plane flight back to their home country on the US Tax payers.
Solutions:
1. Create a Comprehensive Immigration Plan. If there is employment available for the people, they should be given a guest worker status. That status should be renewed every year, and if there are no jobs, they need to return to their home country. This will be applicable even if they have US Citizen wives or children. There is no reason why a family cannot survive in their home country. (Yes, I know this is easier said than done)
2. These guest workers should be able to buy their own health care, and be treated accordingly.
3. There are a lot of people from Mexico, who cross the border to get free health care in the US. They have to pay for such care in Mexico. Allow hospitals to refuse such care and send them back. Once we do this for a few time, the flow will stop
4. Do what Obama did. Deport all criminals.
5. Stop thinking about a wall. There will inevitably be tunnels under the wall.

The 9th Circuit today, in an unanimous decision, indefinitely stayed the Executive Order banning individuals from the 7 Muslim countries. The broadly written order, called by Mr. Trump as “Beautifully written….which even a bad high school student would understand”, banned anyone coming in from the seven countries and applied to Green card holders, visa holders and everyone. The Trump administration argued that the seven countries were identified by Mr. Obama as terrorist breeding ground. After the defeat, Mr. Trump has said that he would issue another executive order. Hopefully this one will be narrowly drawn and exclude people possessing a green card or a visa.
But the real issue is that Trump is ruling by creating fear in the minds of people. That fear when generalized lead to the hatred of all Muslims. So far, this country is everyone’s country. You did not have to be Christian or white to belong here. Is there a particular dress code or food or entertainment that defines America? If this was Saudi Arabia, we women would have to cover ourselves head to toe. If we were to live there, we would curse at the heat and the cover and would not like that country. Similarly, getting people to not wear the hijab in France has led to Muslim people feel alienated. And thus, the most number of radicalized Muslims are from France.
I hear a lot of talk of how America needs to “assimilate” the Muslims. Is eating pork, or dressing in shorts American? Is eating beef American? How do you define America? And CAN you define America? You feel American if the general people love you and are friends. So far, America had done an amazing job doing just that, accepting everyone, no matter what our ethnicity is. We listen to Fareed Zakaria or Arianna Huffington, no matter their accents. Trump’s America might fail to do that. By hating Muslims, they will effectively shove Muslims to become radicalized.
And this brings me to my final point—Travel ban. I will even refrain from uttering the word Muslim. Is travel really essential to learn to become a terrorist? We have the internet. I have done many things that I would normally not have; simply by watching you tube videos. A recent New York Times article investigated the so called “lone wolf” attacks and proved that ISIS is behind all those killings. And the hatred for Muslims will only exacerbate the situation. Maybe Trump has no qualms about putting America in danger, because an unsafe America will only increase his power.

No Current Plans to Expand Travel Ban Beyond Current Countries (Updated February 2, 2017)

We have been hearing rumors that no one is allowed to get into the plane in Karachi, Pakistan. There are also rumors that other countries will be added to the ban. Thus American Immigration Lawyer’s Association asked Department of State to clarify.

In response to rumors of plans to expand the travel ban to other countries, DOS informed American Immigration Lawyer’s Association that there is no addendum, annex, or amendment now being worked on to expand visa revocations or the travel ban to countries other than those currently implicated in the Executive Order entitled, “Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States.” This includes Columbia and Venezuela which have been widely rumored to be under consideration and Pakistan. DOS confirmed that there is no information that supports such a rumor and asked that AILA members help end the spread of this false information.

So as of now, only people holding passports of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen are being detained. Green Card (Permanent Resident Card) holders and visa holders from these countries are also being put to secondary inspection which is taking at least 6-7 hours after they come to US from foreign travel. Some officers might be prejudiced and worse than others. The Green card holders might even be asked to give up their green cards. Never do that. Resist and ask for an attorney

So far, if you were born in these countries, but have other passports, then you are not stopped.

No refugees form these seven countries will be allowed in from these seven countries for at least 90 days

However please note that when Trump made the Executive Order the Department of State was not informed about it. They learned it just like all of us.